Global insurance intermediary group Howden has selected leading software provider AutoRek to boost the efficiency of key back-office processes through intelligent automation.

The new partnership will help Howden to centralise and streamline areas of its Insurance Broker Accounting (IBA) operations, increasing capacity for future growth and improve data control.

AutoRek will automate insurer statement reconciliation processes for the IBA team, loading statements from insurers across the market, before reconciling thousands of transactions against their policy administration systems (PAS).

The output of reconciliations will be automatically posted back into Howden’s PAS systems, ensuring insurer ledger records are up to date. AutoRek will provide Howden with a solution that enables faster, more efficient settlement to insurers that also reduces the burden of unallocated cash on their Markets. With AutoRek’s query management workflow capability, the time taken to resolve queries is also reduced by providing visibility of query status across the business.

The AutoRek solution will support Howden’s UK&I business initially, with a view to potential expansion across the business in the future.

AutoRek’s Insurance Lead Piers Williams commented: “We’re thrilled to be working with Howden and excited to help it realise its goals over the coming years.

“As the go-to automated reconciliation solution for some of the biggest names in insurance, we’re well-placed to help streamline Howden’s reconciliation process and enable the organisation to gain total control of its data in that area.

“The win also marks AutoRek’s growing presence in the sector. It’s great to see our no-code intelligent automation solution continuing to improve insurance firms’ operational efficiency and data control.”

Howden’s Head of IBA UK Operations Guy Turner said: “Insurer statement reconciliations are especially onerous on our resources and we expect AutoRek to significantly reduce the expenditure of effort in this area, which in turn will not only enhance our service to our markets but will also release our staff to concentrate on more value-added tasks. We are very much looking forward to deploying the solution in this regard.”